Crime Today News
Now – 9.00 am, December 14, 2018
“So, Meenakshi, tell me, who died?” Dr Bhatia adjusts her spectacles and smiles at her.
“Ananth fucking Reddy! He is dead,” Meenakshi wishes she’d had more than the three almonds she had quickly stuffed in her mouth while driving to Dr Bhatia’s clinic. She is glad for the cookies that lie in an exquisitely carved glass bowl on the table. She stares at the bowl and wonders how Dr Bhatia keeps the clinic like a room out of an interior décor magazine when she talks to people with filthy, messed up minds all day long.
“And does that bother you? Another crime?” she takes out her diary and pen, making a quick scribble on it. She sits opposite Meenakshi in her uniform, at least that’s what Meenakshi believes, in a cream silk shirt and carbon black pencil line skirt, which is sometimes exchanged with navy or grey skirts. Her hair is neatly tied in a bun, and large glasses adorn her pixie face. She is expensive, or that’s what Meenakshi has heard. But then again, she is the designated therapist for the Koramangala police department, Inspectors, and above. Even though she gets paid for it, she calls it her pro bono work.
“It shouldn’t have, but it does, because now we can’t go for our vacation to Bali and Akshay left me last night,” her voice tethers on the edge of a hysterical guffaw, with her lips pursed. Dr Bhatia doesn’t react, not even a sliver of surprise. Instead, she scribbles some more on her pad. This makes Meenakshi make a fist and dig her nails into her palm. It is as if Dr Bhatia expected Akshay to leave her, in fact, Meenakshi thinks, she seems surprised that he didn’t leave sooner.
“I am sorry to hear that, Meenakshi. Tell me what happened.”
“Nothing,” despite the desire to punch her face, Meenakshi answers the question. “I reached home pretty late last night, rather pretty early this morning. I saw Adi again, he was calling me to bed, my little baby had been waiting up all night long to sleep next to his Mumma.”
“Did you smoke weed again?”
“Yes,” Meenakshi meets her gaze, a look of defiance stains her face into an angry red, daring Dr Bhatia to be the sanctimonious bitch she expects her to be. To tell her that she knows she isn’t supposed to mix antipsychotics with recreational drugs. To admonish her as though she is a child.
But all Dr Bhatia says is, “Go on.”
“Akshay saw me, stoned out of my head. He was obviously pissed off, you know. And then I had to tell him we can’t take the vacation, and that was it for him. He went back to our bedroom and slammed the door shut.
“What happened next?”
“I left for the morgue to meet Ananth’s family, and Akshay texted me that he’ll move out before I come back home.”
“How do you feel about that, Meenakshi?”
Meenakshi can feel a lump wedge its way up her throat, waiting to be released in a primordial wail, her lips quiver to hold her sorrow in. She looks around the bright, white, clinical room with a metallic clock that clicks every second. She looks back at her therapist, the carefully arranged face that betrays no emotion, the same nude lipstick every single time she sees her, the same perfume, Tom Ford’s Black Orchid, every time Meenakshi walks into the room, the same bland, beige notebook that she scribbles in.
“Doctor, why is your first name Cookie? Pretty ridiculous name for a therapist, don’t you think? Cookie Bhatia?” Meenakshi says each word slowly, relishing the taste of mockery on her tongue, “Did your parents hate you?”
“Stop deflecting, Meenakshi,” Dr Bhatia is still smiling, the insults rolling down her back like water on steel.
“Stop making me feel like I am talking to a robot, Cookie,” Meenakshi leans forward, without leaving the therapist’s gaze.
“My father was visiting London when I was born. He had a choco-chip cookie in his mouth when he received the news of my birth, hence the name,” she smiles, a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “Now answer my question.”
Meenakshi sighs, “I feel like my life is unravelling,” the wail finally breaks free and a barrage of words tumble out of Meenakshi, “It has been since Adi died, and I don’t know how the fuck to put it back together. I don’t know how Akshay could deal with Adi’s death so… so fucking beautifully. How could he hit the gym, eat right, live right, have a social life… after… after we lost our baby. WHY IS HE NOT MOURNING?” The last sentence comes out in a scream and Meenakshi wants to break that pretty glass bowl which holds the cookies, slit Dr Bhatia’s throat with the broken shards of the coffee mug lying untouched in front of her, strangle her because she isn’t surprised that Akshay is leaving her. After six months of therapy, Akshay and she should have been blissfully happy, not separating.
“You resent Akshay for pulling his life back together, don’t you?”
Meenakshi slow-claps, “Aren’t you the queen of obvious prognoses!”
“Where do you think he will stay, Cookie?” Meenakshi continues. “Do you think he will hole up with that bitch from work? The one he keeps texting all the time?”
“I don’t know the answer to that, Meenakshi. What bothers you more? That he is leaving or that he might stay with a female friend?”
“Don’t worry, I will find out. I am a fucking cop.”
“That was not my question, Meenakshi.”
“My whole life bothers me, Doctor. My existence bothers me, Ananth fucking Reddy bothers me, his bastard father bothers me, that Ananth’s wife is expecting a child when I have lost mine bothers me, Akshay leaving me and holing up with that whore bothers me. I want nothing else but Adi. I want my child back, I want my life back!” tears roll down Meenakshi’s cheeks as Dr Bhatia hands her a box of tissues.
“Meenakshi,” she says after a long silence, waiting for Meenakshi’s loud sobs to turn into silent sniffles, “Are you doing the meditation exercises I had asked you to?”
“No…” Meenakshi wipes her nose and throws the tissue in the bin.
“You need to, Meenakshi. You really need to centre and balance your emotions. Right now, everything is clutter in your mind, the kind of clutter where Adi is the epicentre.”
“Give me something stronger. I don’t think these antidepressants work anymore. And I can’t sit and fucking meditate.”
“No, I wouldn’t advise that. In fact, I am going to start weaning you off them. You can’t keep on with this all your life. You need to heal.”
“But… but I can’t. Believe me, I am trying,” Meenakshi wails.
Dr Bhatia leans forward and stares into Meenakshi’s eyes. “Don’t be scared of healing, you won’t forget Adi. Don’t make his memory the cause of your destruction.”
“You know, I could get stronger doses myself, if I wanted to. In fact, I could get your license revoked, and you know that,” her eyes harden and she stands up.
“Do you think threatening your therapist will help you heal?” Dr Bhatia leans back in her chair.
“No, but right about now, it makes me feel pretty darned good,” Meenakshi says, walking out the door. “See you next week.”
Excerpted with permission from Shameless in Stilettos, Ell P, Tara Press.
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